Topic

Data Driven Product Backlog Prioritisation Mechanism

Response

The successful implementation of a product backlog calls for the adoption of a prioritisation process that strikes a balance between a series of internal and external factors.

Internal factors include, but not limited too:

innovation and creative ability,
current internal resource capabilities
financial status.

External factors includes, but not limited too:

stakeholder needs and wants,
competitor actions,
changing customer circumstances
or emerging technology.

Striking the right balance between internal and external factors requires the team to follow a well proven continuous value creation life cycle. With each stage consisting of a number of elements that build on the previous one. The process consists of the following steps.:

Capturing Business Objectives including Key Results
Solicit Feature for all the Team’s stakeholders
Establish the contribution each Feature makes to achieving the objectives and key results
Size the implementation effort of each Feature
Prioritise the Features by combining their business value and relative size

The implementation order is typically established by focusing on the Features that represent the highest value and require the least amount of effort.

Let's a take a closer look at the business objectives life cycle that incorporates the objectives and key results technique. Commonly referred to as OKR.

The infographic shows how defined business objectives and key results translate into a prioritised set of features, which are then assigned to a team.

1. Business Objectives including Key Results are captured from internal business leaders.

2. Features. The team invests a wealth of time capturing feature requests from their community of stakeholders, made up of, internal and external users, internal business managers, existing and new customers and partners, .

3. Feature Contribution. The team comes together to determine the contribution each of the features make to each of the key results.

4. T-shirt Sizing. The second value the team collaborates on, is the estimated effort to complete each feature. Performing these assessments collaboratively enables the team to quickly reach a consensus on the scope, detail and value of each feature without the need for extensive documentation

5. Prioritised Features. Eventually, the team will be able to publish a feature roadmap, by plotting each of the features against a two axis chart. Effort along the x axis and the feature contribution value on the y axis.

The order of implementation is determined by the position of each feature on the value path. Starting with those features that require the least amount of effort and create the highest value.

A Data-driven Prioritisation Technique

To provide newly appointed product owners and formed teams with support during the early stage of forming their first product backlog, we recommend teams use the House of Quality template associated to this learning article.

With its predefined columns, headings and the assigned validation values, teams can quickly adopt the 5 stage business objectives life cycle, described earlier.

Discover more

Additional information, including working examples and templates are available in the Monetical knowledge base.